Birth Control
by My-Crazy-Awesome-Sox
Summary: Olivia realizes she's skipped a month... Tag for "Brave New World Part 1" 4.21


**A/N:** Hey all, another fluffy little oneshot involving happy baby thoughts. This is also pretty much my headcanon for how exactly Olivia got pregnant with Etta by accident. She just seems too much the type to be on top of things like that and I highly doubt Peter would be lax with birth control since he never wanted to be tied down for so long. And even if she didn't know she was pregnant, she most certainly had an inkling that she could be with that nursery comment at the beginning of "A Brave New World Part 1".

Also, **PSA**: The pill is only effective if regularly taken very near the same time each day. If you know you've been wonky with your timing, or skipped a day by accident, use a backup method! Same for the shots only with every three months. Nothing wrong with condoms if you aren't ready to be a parent or grapple with the decision of what to do if you or your partner gets pregnant. :)

Enjoy!

* * *

From the time Rachel had been a teenager, her body had worked like clockwork. She could mark her calendar and know the exact day to stop wearing the silky, lacy underwear she was so fond of.

Olivia had never had that luxury.

It was really no wonder when she thought of all the abuse she put her body through. Constant worry about her mother, then trying to be both a sister and a mother to Rachel, lifelong insomnia, the military, poor eating habits, and the cluster-fuck that was Fringe Division had hardly given her body a chance to pin down a rhythm. She'd tried the pill when she was in college, but between overloading on coursework, all-nighters, and attempting to keep Rachel from making consistently worse life-choices, she'd never really gotten the hang of taking it at the same time every day. The constant ire of her male military unit mates telling her that her 'anti-bitch pill wasn't working' was the final straw when it came to that method of contraceptive.

But she'd started dating Lucas and had needed _something_, so she switched over to the shot. Quick, easy, made the next appointment for three months in the future each time she got the shot so she wouldn't forget. So for nearly the last decade her period had been tamed to some semblance of a schedule. Which is why a mildly uneasy feeling began to creep up on her when she realized she hadn't menstruated in somewhere around six weeks. Possibly longer now that she really thought about it. She tried to shake off the feeling. She phone hadn't reminded her about a doctor's appointment on her calendar and she could clearly remember getting her last shot not long before Peter had gotten into the machine two and a half months ago.

Accept that hadn't just been two and half months ago.

It certainly felt like it based on her memories, but one thing they'd realized before too long is that when her memories from this timeline were overwritten by the ones from the original timeline…well, she'd lost some time. She had very few memories from the six months between when Peter stepped into the machine and when her memories began resurfacing. But she'd still been the same person, so surly she'd been keeping up with birth control for the convenience if not practical usage. When she checked the calendar on her phone, Olivia felt the uneasiness increase when there was no appointment scheduled in either future or past months. So she searched her room for something that could reassure her.

Which is when she found the pack of birth control pills laying innocently in her bedside drawer.

Olivia paled. Apparently, in this timeline, she'd never made the switch to the shot. And the date neatly written under the first pill was not two weeks before she'd started to regain her memories. And judging from the small number of pills taken, she'd stopped taking them a couple of days after the Westfield case. Because she'd forgotten that she'd been taking the pill instead of getting shots. She'd effectively been having unprotected sex, rather frequently at that, for nearly a month and a half. And she hadn't needed a tampon in more than that.

Olivia's stomach dropped.

She could be pregnant. It was still a possibility that the amount of stress she'd been dealing with had shut off her non-essential bodily functions for a little bit. It wouldn't be the first time she'd skipped a month for just that reason. But it would be the first time it happened while enthusiastically making up for lost time with the love of her life. So pregnancy was definitely an option. Olivia sat on the edge of her bed and concentrated on taking a few deep, even breaths.

Would a baby really be so bad? Sure their life was crazy, but it wasn't like waiting any longer was going to change that fact. She'd always wanted to be a mother. To have a child of her own that she could give a better childhood to than she had. To have something in her life that was still innocent. The dream had only gotten stronger when Ella was born and continued to grow every time she had been able to hold her niece and watch her grow. And Peter…Peter would make a wonderful father, she'd known that from the first time she'd seen him with Ella. Saying their relationship was emotionally stable would be a laughable understatement and they'd even decided to start looking for a house together. They were solid, there was no question about that.

Olivia relaxed as she pictured a little baby with her eyes and his smile. No, a baby wouldn't be so bad. But there was no point in having her heart set before she knew for sure, so she deftly dialed her doctor's office and scheduled an appointment in two days. If she was pregnant they could do all the first appointment necessities then, if not then she could get the birth control shot and bring up the topic of future children with Peter when they found a place to call theirs.

When, the next morning, Peter jumped into the real estate section of the paper with as much gusto as everything else he did, she couldn't stop herself from inquiring about a nursery. She hadn't meant to, but the words had been out of her mouth before she could stop them. It only took the span of his gentle question for her to be certain she was ready to have that conversation with him then and she definitively confirmed that, yes, she would like there to be a nursery. She worried for a moment that Peter may react badly to her seemingly rushed timeline, but any fear of that disappeared immediately when she saw his slow, bright smile, and the wonder in his eyes. If it hadn't been for the interruption of their phones, she had no doubt they would have started on a need for that nursery right then.

In the end, it turned out the issue of birth control had been moot since their first night together.


End file.
